31 March 2009

Hitman has updated his developer journal, stating his and Christan's work on new code and animations for the belt fed weapons, allowing the linked ammo chain to show it's depletion. In addition to the belt fed weapons, Christian has been working on the nomenclature reload animations which look "just plain kick ass."

Hitman has also worked on new grenade code which is in testing and initial feedback is positive and there are no major bugs in the current release.

30 March 2009

AirWolf, creator of ps_forest, is no longer a member of the FAS Team in any capacity: his name is off the team list, screen shots and videos of ps_forest are no longer on the FAS site or FAS's ModDB site and his developer's journal no longer exist. However, the designs he created (at least the ones featured on his developers blog) for the FAS flags are still being used in media screen shots which can be found on the flags in ps_snowstorm.

When asked about his absence, the only response by a team member is that "he is no longer on the team. That is all anyone outside of development needs to know about it." While the curt response would make it seem as if there was some trouble.

"Let it be said that you never want to join a mod unless you can take criticism. Yeah, sometimes you'd like to say, screw you I know what I want and other times, after you sit back and think about it for a while, you realize they might be right," Airwolf said in his last developer's journal post. The rest of the post though has no other indication of discourse, commenting on the creation of a new map, as well as new menu that was conceptualized when FAS was still named Incursion.

With no statement from Airwolf or the FAS Team, there is no way to know what has happened. Airwolf could of left on his own reasons, not having time to work on FAS due to personal or financial reasons; or he could of made an artistic stand on ps_forest that wouldn't have worked well for FAS high standard of gameplay and visual quality.

28 March 2009

In the 15 March 2009 news post, Naota talks about the M24's as well as the M82's damage mechanics in FAS. The M24 "does around 340 damage to the head including the helmet mitigation amount" he begins. This high damage makes a head shot a guaranteed kill almost all the time, even when shooting though some objects in game. The lowest damage he has seen the M24 do was 74 damage after firing though a very large model. While many weapons have noticeable penetration fall off, the M24's "penetration falloff is also pretty lenient." Naota uses an anecdote that a head shot thorough a barrier of sheet metal did 304 damage.

The M82 is the M24 on steroids. "A single chest shot will do 96 damage to medium armour and instantly kill anyone wearing light," Naota states and continues, "head shots clock in around 890ish damage." Balancing this power, the M82 has some restrictions on it that make it harder to use than the other sniper rifles. Besides it's high credit cost, the M82 will "unscopes whenever you move, has huge kick and a slow ROF, and is notably inaccurate when standing." However, using the bipod negates many of these downsides as well as increasing it's rate of fire to that of the 3.0 SVD.

In response to a question on ModDB regarding how difficult it would be to kill someone, Hitman explains that the "amount of firepower it takes to kill someone depends on a number of factors." Such factors include the ammo of the weapon you are using, where you hit the person - be it a limb, chest or head shot - and what armor they have.

Also, the distance you are from the enemy is a factor. FAS incorporates damage drop off, "so pistol-caliber weapons lose a lot of power over short distances, versus assault rifles, which do not."

As there are so many factors determining how many hits a player can take, it is impossible to give a solid number. However, head shots seem to be the most constant as they are "instant-death, unless the target is wearing a helmet." If the player is wearing a helmet, then it would be two shots; three if the weapon is low caliber and there is an extreme distance between both players. Of course, even with a helmet, the M24 and M82 will still kill in one head shot.

15 March 2009

The M24 sniper rifle is FAS's light sniper rifle modeled and textured by Naota. The M24 is a 17 credits which is more expensive than most other weapons, but still leaves enough cedits for an AR or SMG backup or a lot of armor and a pistol. The M24 has a slow rate of fire, but guarantees instant kills via head shot and the bipod allows players to sacrifice mobility for a higher rate of fire.

FAS's bipod system as Naota describes is, "the most intuitive and fluid I've ever seen in an FPS." The bipod code allows players to deploy on just "about anything that's the right distance and angle from your gun." This includes other players as well as on a wall looking straight up.

The M14 rifle, modeled and textured by Dekier, is another battle rifle similar to the G3. At 11 credits, it lacks the full auto feature of the G3, but makes up for it with an aim point allowing for easier ranged combat.

Finally is the DV-2 - modeled by Naota and textured by Dr.Hubbler - the Russian equivalent to the US KA-BAR knife. The FAS Team chose the DV-2 to add more diversity to the arsenal.

Finally, for those wondering about the weapon cost (10 credit MP5 vs 11 credit M14) DysPatch commented that the weapon page will be revised over spring break.